Letters, Extracts, Notices, §c. 305 



Atlantic from West to East was certainly new to me, and the 

 evidence may be worth recording. The birds were first met 

 with on October 11th (lat. 45° N., long. 15° W.). They 

 kept passing us on the 12th, 13th, and 14th (lat. 50° N., 

 long. 15° W.). They were not in large numbers, but I saw 

 from a dozen to a score, singly and in twos and threes, during 

 each of these four days. It was difficult to observe their 

 original direction, as they sighted the ship before we saw them 

 and altered their course towards it. On leaving the vessel the 

 majority held on due cast. With half the Atlantic between 

 t hem and land they were travelling with a buoyant undulating 

 flight and shewing no signs of fatigue. Only one or two 

 settled on board, and those only for a minute or two. They 

 passed and circled round the big liner (running 18 or 19 miles 

 an hour) as if she were standing still. As a guess I should 

 say that they were travelling well over GO miles an hour. 

 Now the length of time for which a Snow-Bunting can 

 sustain flight with no possibility of feeding must necessarily 

 be very limited. From what I saw I can only conclude that 

 Plectrophanes nivalis is quite capable of crossing the 

 Atlantic Ocean in one flight, and probably does not require 

 48 hours for the journey. 



I saw no other land-birds during the voyage. 



Yours &c, 



A. L. Butler 

 (Director of Game-Preservation, 



Khartoum, Soudan, Soudan Government). 



Dec. 21st, 1903. 



Sirs, — A few weeks ago I acquired at a small bird-dealer's 

 shop a living Chaffinch {Fringilla cwlebs) which had been 

 caught in a wild state in this country in the autumn of 1902. 

 The bird is a male, in beautiful condition, and may be 

 described as follows : — Head and nearly the whole of the 

 upper parts pale canary-yellow; mantle bright yellow; 

 lower part of back yellow with a greenish tinge. A few of 

 the primaries on both sides and a few of the smaller feathers 

 were of the usual colour. Tail yellow, with two of the 

 outer feathers on each side dark. Underside yellow mixed 

 with the usual wine-colour. Sides almost wholly yellow. 



